At its core, coaching is a relationship between two people built upon a foundation of trust and communication. This should be the first place an aspiring coach invests his or her time and energy: understanding how to connect, learning how to listen and communicate, working to gain trust. The rest of their education, in whatever form it takes, is ongoing from there.
I asked readers of the morning shakeout how running has helped improve their mental health, overcome challenges in their lives, and/or made a difference in their lives beyond its physical benefits. Throughout the month of May, I’ll be sharing those stories in a series of posts on themorningshakeout.com. It’s my hope that by compiling these stories and sharing them widely it will help someone who is struggling to feel less alone, start running, and/or seek out the help they need.
I asked readers of the morning shakeout how running has helped improve their mental health, overcome challenges in their lives, and/or made a difference in their lives beyond its physical benefits. Throughout the month of May, which is Mental Health Awareness Month, I’ll be sharing those stories in a series of posts on this website. It’s my hope that by compiling these stories and sharing them widely it will help someone who is struggling to feel less alone, start running, and/or seek out the help they need.
I love ladder sessions. It's a great feeling mentally when you start coming back down the ladder and know the longest intervals are behind you. This workout is not that and that's exactly the point.
The "Reverse Michigan" workout is an ascending ladder on the track—starting with a fast 400m, ending with a strong mile—interspersed with longer stretches of tempo running off the track between intervals. It's a great blend of speed and strength that can be beneficial to nearly any runner whether they're training for the mile, the marathon or anything in between.
This past Saturday I raced the 1500m at the first of two winter all-comers track meets at Cal Berkeley’s Edwards Stadium. It was the first 1500 I’ve competed in since 2004 and my first proper track race at any distance since 2009 (save running every event at a different all-comers meet as a workout a few summers ago). I laced up a pair of spikes for the first time since 2006 and as I was doing so wondered for a brief second what the hell I was getting myself into.
One-kilometer repeats are a pretty standard workout for many runners training for the mile all the way up to the marathon, and no matter how you slice ’em, they tend to make for a tough session.
So what do I think about the 2020 U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon qualifying standards? I’ve gotten this question at least a dozen times in the past few days and here’s where I’ve landed: I personally believe the women’s field at the 2020 Trials in Atlanta was way too big (511 athletes) while the men’s was just about right (260), so the existing standards needed to be evaluated and adjusted accordingly. The main purpose of having an Olympic Trials race is to choose the Olympic team; the secondary purposes are to create opportunity and experience for up-and-coming athletes and, as Sarah Lorge Butler wrote in the aforelinked piece for Runner’s World, "to connect elite running with a broad audience.”
Mario Fraioli responds to Scott Fauble's blog post about super shoes in the sport of competitive distance running.
